Many facilities receive deliveries from a variety of sources and delivery services on a regular basis. Such facilities include a variety of shopping facilities (including large so-called box stores), distribution centers, and so forth. In some cases such deliveries may be received at any time over the better portion of the day (including, in some cases, 24 hour availability in these regards). The deliveries themselves can include, for example, bulk and/or individually-ordered items that are intended for further distribution and/or sale.
In many cases it is desirable or even critical that completion of each delivery include receiving the delivered item(s) inside the receiving facility. In many cases, however, the receiving facility controls access to the interior of the facility as part of an observed security protocol. Assigning (part time or full time) a facility associate to be available to effectuate or monitor such access can represent considerable cost and often an inefficient use of that associate's time.
To accommodate the aforementioned needs while avoiding an inefficient use of an associate's time, some prior art approaches provide for the delivery person to effectuate their own entry to the facility in order to complete their delivery. As one example in these regards, the facility may vet and authorize a particular delivery person or service (prior to any scheduled delivery) and assign that person/service a corresponding indication of that authorization (i.e., an indication, such as a personal identification number (PIN), that corresponds to the person or the service) that can be used in future visits to gain entry to the facility. Though useful, such an approach does not necessarily meet the needs of all application settings. For example, administering such an approach can task security personnel with additional burdens that of course represent additional effort and overhead costs.
Elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions and/or relative positioning of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of various embodiments of the present teachings. Also, common but well-understood elements that are useful or necessary in a commercially feasible embodiment are often not depicted in order to facilitate a less obstructed view of these various embodiments of the present teachings. Certain actions and/or steps may be described or depicted in a particular order of occurrence while those skilled in the art will understand that such specificity with respect to sequence is not actually required. The terms and expressions used herein have the ordinary technical meaning as is accorded to such terms and expressions by persons skilled in the technical field as set forth above except where different specific meanings have otherwise been set forth herein.